


Beasts of a Feather

by tansybells



Category: Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses
Genre: Demons, Dubious Church Camp, F/F, The Beast speaks to Marianne, Too many eyes, Transformation, Wings, demonic transformation, mild body horror, we know the devil au
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-27
Updated: 2020-03-27
Packaged: 2021-03-01 00:01:19
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,432
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23335801
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tansybells/pseuds/tansybells
Summary: The girls who give in to the devil never return. Every camper knows that. But when Hilda fails to return from her night defending against the devil, Marianne takes it upon herself to do the unthinkable: she abandons the safety of camp to save her.
Relationships: Marianne von Edmund/Hilda Valentine Goneril
Comments: 6
Kudos: 39





	Beasts of a Feather

**Author's Note:**

> that feeling when your crush turns into a multieyed devil, but you still think it’s kinda hot?

Marianne kept her distance, as always, but even the barrier of space wasn’t enough to completely muffle what the other girls were saying.

_ …can’t believe she didn’t come back… _

_ …always was kinda useless… _

_…said that they had to_ _do everything all night….so lazy…_

_ …-n’t find her and they’ve been looking all morning! _

She must have drifted too close, because then; the gossip drew to a hush and a few of the girls started giving her that disgusted, side-eyed look she’d become so used to receiving over the past few weeks.

If only they knew.

Perhaps it was  _ because  _ they knew that Marianne had been exempt from going out to the cabin for so long. 

Yes, that must be it. 

In a world where the devil was real and absolute in its existence, the summer camp they attended had been transformed into a great stronghold. They were the last defense of humanity. They were safe to carry out their normal camp activities during the day, true, but when the devil’s nocturnal realm took control, they leapt into action. 

Each night, a group of girls went out to the cabin, forming what was the front line against the devil. Each night, everyone would come home, temporarily comforted by the fact that they had been granted one more day of safety. 

It took an endless wellspring of self-confidence and fortitude to defy the devil, or so Hilda had told her. With that knowledge, it made sense that Hilda was so often called to the front lines It made even  _ more _ sense that Marianne herself was never among that number. 

She could not blame them. 

The other girls must have - somehow - known of the quiet longings for strength that stirred in her heart, and had thus deemed it necessary for her to remain as far from the devil as possible. She had to stay by god’s side, cling to his every word and beg with each fiber of her being that her sins would be absolved – even at the cost of her existence itself.

Perhaps they knew that if she were to be tempted by the devil, she might be too weak to resist, and would willingly open her heart in favor of giving up and let –

But that was no longer an issue, was it? Because Hilda had been among the group chosen to protect them from the devil, and last night, Hilda had been  _ taken _ by the devil;  _ picked _ and  _ chosen  _ and  _ devoured. _ She had been the only one lost that the scouts hadn’t been able to find within a day.

While Marianne couldn’t help but feel a glimmer of relief at having survived herself,she had to wonder: How much of the loss was her fault? Hilda was also the only one who had been kind to her, despite her preference for self-imposed solitude. SheHilda had managed to see past Marianne’s barriers and weasel her way in through the cracks formed by her desire for companionship.

Was this punishment, then? Was it Hilda’s punishment for her unwarranted kindness, or was it Marianne’s for allowing her to come so close? Would Hilda have still been lost if she had actually listened to Marianne’s half-hearted pleas to stay away? There was no way to know anymore. All that remained was Marianne.

Well… Marianne, and her Beast.

Suddenly, the sirens set around the camp began to wail, increasing in strength and severity, indicative of the devil’s mearing presence. 

Most of the girls who had been steadily moving away from Marianne began to huddle together or run about in excitement-inspired chaos. A few of the more intrepid ones, however, immediately ran to consult the camp counselors before picking up a few coils of the heavy-duty wire that lay around. Those, wires in hand, set ensuring that none of the sirens or radio towers fell prey to the interference that came hand-in-hand with the devil’s approach.

Meanwhile, counselors began the process of barking out their orders and choosing a team to be the new front line against the devil. Unsurprisingly, Marianne was once again passed over for the task. Really, it was a relief to go back to her cabin and not have to face humanity’s worst nightmare. 

And normally, she would.

Tonight, however, everything went wrong.

It began with the too-familiar voice of her Beast. Thick and sickly sweet like molasses, stemming from a place deep within her own mind. The voice was impossible to ignore.

**Oh, my darling.**

**Why won’t you come home to me?**

Marianne didn’t even have a moment to process the Beast’s plea before she heard a voice like the sweetest of forbidden fruits. 

Hilda’s.

_ “Marianne?” _ Her ears perked up at the sound and Marianneturned face the source of the voice: the forest surrounding the camp, where the endless sirens and lanterns were the only barrier against her own Beast’s call. 

It was the last place she’d seen Hilda, where she’d last let her self-sure smile beam out towards Marianne before making her way to the cabin.

No one else seemed to have heard anything. Or if they had, they didn’t respond to it. No, everyone rushed about with the calm certainty that they had done this before, they were doing it now, and that they would undoubtedly do it again in the future.

Marianne shook her head and returned to watching the other campers mill about.

_ “Marianne, are you there? I’m scared…” _

She heard Hilda’s voice again, and this time Marianne couldn’t help but take a step in that direction.

Logically, she knew that Hilda had been taken. She was gone – and as all the campers knew, the chance of returning to the grace of god after being seduced by the devil was next to nothing. 

Emotionally, however, Marianne couldn’t bring herself to actually give up on her friend. She had sounded so sad, so lonely and scared. She couldn’t overlook that desperation. She owed Hilda for her endless kindness, which she had never been deserving of but had received nonetheless.

Even so, she had to consider that if Hilda was really out there, and she was really in trouble, what hellish future would she consign her to by failing to act? Would she even be able to live with herself after the fact?

_ “Can anyone hear me?” _

Hilda’s voice broke, and Marianne knew what she had to do.

With a furtive glance over her shoulder to check that neither campers nor counselors had eyes on her, she picked up the camp-provided cardigan that she’d left draped over the last chair she’d sat on. Her movements were too stilted to be really considered normal, she knew that much, but as she pulled the cardigan over her arms and let it settle over her shoulders, she was once again reminded that despite the strengths of her convictions in their god, no one had ever paid enough attention to her to actually care.

She had to rescue the one person here at camp who did.

* * *

**It must be so difficult for you.**

Ducking under branches and climbing over fallen trees, Marianne followed the sound of Hilda’s voice. The Beast spoke the entire time she walked through the forest, her voice growing more and more impossible to ignore the further Marianne ventured from the intricate system of lights and wires situated around the campsite.

**No, it is. I know.**

A thin branch that she failed to move out of the way before walking past snapped and hit her in the face. Instinctively, she brushed her hand against the stinging wound. It came back bloody. She wiped her hand against her skirt, too preoccupied with her search to think about the inevitable stain.

**For I witnessed the shaping and molding of your creation.**

Her feet hurt. The forest was so thick and deep, so similar throughout that she had long lost track of how long she’d been walking. It was nearing the end of summer, yet despite the way her sweat-soaked shirt clung to her torso, she could not escape a near-constant chill.

**But no one can be as aware of the weakness and frailty of your body as you yourself.**

Each of the Beast’s words wrapped a barbed tendril around her heart and squeezed.

**Marianne.**

She hugged herself with the hope that doing so would bring her comfort.

**Please.**

There was none to be found.

**Dearest one. Come home to me.**

Only in the embrace of the Beast would she find home.

_ “Marianne!” _ Hilda’s voice, closer than before, was an appreciated distraction from the Beast’s allure.  _ “Marianne, are you close?” _

The tightness of Marianne’s grasp on her upper arms slightly loosened. Then, she let go entirely to cup her hands around her mouth and quietly call out in response. Yet no matter how loudly she called for her friend, her own voice was swallowed up by the endless ocean of trees.

Her heart clenched; she clutched the edges of her cardigan together like armor.

She was tiny. Inconsequential. Meaningless.

She was alone, as she had always been meant to be.

**I can’t offer you the world.**

As solitary as the forest made her feel, however, there was a peace to be found in being wholly and utterly alone. She couldn’t hurt anyone. No one could hurt her. She could shout and scream and cry, and there would be no one nearby to judge her. 

**But I can offer you a home.**

And in the tranquility of that knowledge, there came a freedom that lifted her soul far beyond the horror that had threatened to drown her just moments before.

Marianne looked around, feeling utterly dwarfed by the sheer magnitude of the trees around her. The Beast’s embrace once more enveloped her, and without the hope of light breaking through the thick canopy above, she offered little resistance.

“I can’t find any home on my own,” she sighed, reaching out blindly for the Beast that had for so long whispered in her ear. “There’s nothing out there for me beyond camp, beyond sacrificing myself for those who are… they run away from the devil, and leave us behind.”

An unfamiliar anger bubbled up in her chest, burning her throat and the back of her mouth like acid. Her voice was steady as she addressed the Beast itself for the first time.

“Beast.”

**I am here.**

“You said there is a home for me.”

The Beast said nothing, but Marianne felt a certainty of relief. She took a deep breath. Her hand brushed against something, yet nothing at all.

“Take me there.”

**For you, dearest one, I shall.**

That feeling of relief swelled to a crescendo that overwhelmed Marianne’s senses until she had no option but to wholly surrender.

* * *

The emptiness that consumed her as the Beast’s presence departed her body was enough to bring her to her knees. It was impossible to recall how she had survived so long without having that otherness mingled with her own soul, but standing up on her own two feet to stumble forward towards the nearest cluster of trees didn’t require the Beast’s assistance.

With a resolute nod, Marianne reached forwards to part the endless sea of branches. Her cardigan snagged on them, pulling several threads free of their weave and halting her progress, but still she did not stop.

Finally, Marianne lifted the final branch that separated her from the grove and stepped into the dappled light. But to her dismay, there was no prize to be found. No. Instead of being rewarded with the friend that she’d been searching so long for, the only other figure that existed within the grove was someone else.

Another girl.

She sat on a stump near the other edge of the grove, slouched over with one arm propping up her chin. The long, pink hair that flowed from her head and coiled on the ground completely obscured her face, but Marianne had the uncanny feeling that she was being watched nonetheless.

“Um… sorry, miss,” Marianne whispered as she looked over her shoulder and confirmed that they were indeed alone. No one else was there to spark that uncomfortable feeling. At least, there wasn’t anyone there that she could see. “I’m… um, I’m looking for my friend. Her name is Hilda? I heard her calling for me…”

Wordlessly, the young woman rose.

Wings flowed down from her shoulders, creating the semblance of a shimmering cloak of her own making. Where there weren’t feathers, there were eyes. Wide and arrhythmically blinking, they shone in all the colors known to man – and some beyond even that. Only her face was free of the distortion created by the numerous eyes.

As Marianne looked at her, the young woman’s appearance shifted and evolved in such a way that she couldn’t entirely pin down how she felt about her.

She was bewitching. She was terrible. She was inhuman and fascinating and full of dreadful beauty all in one breath. She was resplendent.

She was…

“Hilda?”

“Marianne… you came.”

Ethereal and light, layered over with numerous chimes that hid a haunting familiarity within, Hilda’s voice brushed against Marianne’s cheek with all the grace of a butterfly’s wing. Light as her voice was, however, it carried with it a gravity that she’d rarely heard Hilda express.

But then, Hilda lifted arms that Marianne couldn’t entirely recognize as arms, leapt forward, and wrapped Marianne up in an embrace that coiled around her and wholly enveloped her.

“Holy shit, Mari! You actually came!” And with that, the majority of Marianne’s concern for the other girl fell to the wayside. It was one thing to see Hilda’s altered form, but to hear her typical exuberance expressed in her words once again was a comfort rivaled only by the knowledge that Hilda was  _ there. _

“Like, I wasn’t gonna give up on getting you to come out here with me, but I didn’t think it’d take you  _ that  _ long to drag your butt out. I chose the most fucking picturesque place and everything! I mean – look at this!” She gestured out at the moonlit grove in which she’d been found, and Marianne had to agree. It was absolutely beautiful. The wind moving through the branches above them not only created an ever-shifting pattern of leaves on the ground, but also ruffled through the iridescent feathers that obscured much of Hilda’s body.

“What happened to you, Hilda?” Marianne whispered as she pulled back just far enough that she could see Hilda’s exhilarated expression. Luminous eyes of various shapes and sizes covered her neck, shoulders and every other instance of exposed skin but for her face and palms, yet Marianne found that she wasn’t scared at all. “I… um, you didn’t come back from the cabin last night? So everyone thinks the devil took you…”

Hilda tossed her head back, her long hair shimmering in the light as she laughed joyously. “She did! She  _ did _ take me, Mari, and it’s legit the best thing that’s  _ ever  _ happened to me!” Releasing Marianne from her hold, she stepped back and spun around to show off the entirety of her transformation. “Like, how absolutely  _ awesome  _ is this?”

Before Marianne had the chance to say anything in response, however, Hilda lunged forwards and grabbed her hand. And as if she was dancing to a song that only she could hear, she twirled Marianne about.

**Is this not your home?**

Hilda’s continued laughter rose into the night, becoming music in its own right. Marianne couldn’t help but become caught up in the delirious fever-dance, despite her reservations about the situation. Soon, her own quiet mirth rose to meet Hilda’s.

**Nowhere else have you been so free to be yourself.**

The Beast’s voice echoed in her mind, joining the chorus of Hilda’s glee. The dissonant allure of the moment broke the enchantment that had fallen upon Marianne, however, and what joy she had experienced came to an end and left her empty. She had come here for a reason.

“Hilda –”

“Mari, I’m so  _ glad  _ you came~”

“Hilda, no!” Marianne ripped her hands out of Hilda’s mid-sway, and pulled back far enough that she was relatively sure that Hilda couldn’t reach out and grab her. “Hilda, I’m – I’m not here to  _ dance _ . Just… come back to the camp with me.”

Hilda stopped. The skin around her lips took on a grim paleness as she pressed them together.

“You’re joking.” She made as if to reach out and take Marianne’s hand again, but Marianne clutched hers close to her chest and shook her head. Hilda deflated.

“You’re… not joking.”

“No. I’m not.” Marianne shifted her gaze to where the furthest reach of Hilda’s feathers grazed the ground. She was so different. So unknowable. It was… she was terrifying, despite the ethereal beauty. 

Despite that, Marianne couldn’t just give up on her. “You’re…the only one who’s kind to me there. I don’t know what I’ll do if – if you’re gone.”

“Then… how about you just stay with me?” 

What little she could see of Hilda suddenly disappeared. Before Marianne had the chance to look around and search for her, a strong pair of wings wrapped around her from behind. She shuddered as the warmth of Hilda’s breath curled against the back of her ear.

“We don’t  _ have  _ to go back to them,” Hilda told her. It didn’t seem to matter to her that they were already alone, because she was so quiet that Marianne could hardly hear her. “You can stay with me; I’m  _ sure  _ the devil will let you do it – ” She giggled. “Mari, it’s fucking  _ perfect _ ! I mean, you’ve definitely gotta have heard her by now.”

Marianne’s stomach churned. It couldn’t be that easy. She was – she was supposed to bring Hilda back. But at the same time, she’d taken that task upon herself – after Hilda had called her, that was. Why had –

“Why did you call me here?”

“Huh?”

Hilda shifted slightly, just enough so that Marianne could barely see her unsettlingly gorgeous face out of the corner of her eyes.

“Uh… so yeah, I kinda wanted you to come with me? Like. The whole devil thing. She said both of us could just fuck off from this whole church camp thing! Together!”

Hilda squeezed Marianne closer. Her voice took on that pleading quality that she so often used against the camp counselors.

“Please?”

Marianne turned away, clenching her jaw as she tried to ignore Hilda’s coercion. Hilda seemed to take note of Marianne’s indecision , and continued her attempts.

“We wouldn’t have to deal with those dumb counselors anymore,” she whispered, the sudden deepening of her voice sending a shudder down Marianne’s spine. “You wouldn’t have to pretend that the awful things those girls say don’t set your very soul  _ aflame _ in anger. You could – your Beast wouldn’t have to bother you anymore!”

“No, no… you don’t know how it is,” Marianne said, clutching her sides tight. How could Hilda suggest such a thing? Hilda, who had so often gone out of her way to be considerate of her inadequacies, was now dangling them in front of her face in the cruelest of taunts. Hilda was supposed to be the one with her head put on straight, free from the ever-haunting Beast. But instead here she was, shrugging off the one thing that plagued Marianne most.

“The Beast  _ calls _ to me, Hilda. It’s so hard to push it away…”

“Oh my god, Mari.” Hilda slithered around to stand before Marianne and clasped the sides of her face between nearly-taloned hands. The fervor that had characterized their conversation so far finally died down as Hilda revealed a seriousness that she had been hiding beneath. “Don’t you get it?  _ Everyone  _ has a fucking Beast. I just finally let mine in for a little chat. And look where we’re at now!”

Hilda’s feathers ruffled in the wind as she stepped away, held an inviting hand out towards her. Marianne’s eyes locked on those two bright pink eyes that she was so familiar with, and all of the  _ otherness  _ that engulfed Hilda faded away to leave nothing but the person Marianne held most precious.

Beneath the wings, the eyes, the chimes, and the ethereal fervor, it was just Hilda. Hilda, who saw the flaws of everyone around her and utilized them to conceal her own. Hilda, who had shed her insecurities to embrace her flaws and weaponize them.

She was brilliant in her acceptance. She was radiant and glorious and  _ captivating,  _ and the longer Marianne was in her presence, the more her heart yearned to join Hilda in the simplicity offered forth by the devil.

By her Beast, the devil.

Hilda caught sight of Marianne’s trembling and smiled. “It’s nothing you don’t deserve,” she whispered. She drew one of Marianne’s trembling hands away from her side and gently kissed the back of it before looking up to her. “I know you’re scared, sweet Mari. But think how free we can be, together, and… consider it?”

Marianne’s breath caught in her throat. With the simple, soft brush of Hilda’s lips against her skin, the last decade’s worth of resistance built up against the Beast began crumbling down about her. And, as Hilda’s lashes fluttered against her cheeks like a butterfly’s kiss before she once again made easy eye contact, Marianne’s resolve dissipated entirely.

She melted. Grasping Hilda’s hand within her own, her trembling yet to dissipate, she drew Hilda close and let her eyes fall shut.

The Beast made her presence known the very moment Marianne reached out for her, her once-chilling presence now an enveloping certainty of love.

**So.**

**You have chosen.**

Hilda looked up to Marianne, and it looked to her like the stars above danced in her eyes. Marianne opened her mouth, but before she had the opportunity to say anything, Hilda lifted herself into the air with a flurry of wings. She threw her arms around Marianne’s shoulders and pressed her lips against Marianne’s in a kiss so earnest and passionate that even the devil herself faded into the background

**Welcome home, my child.**

Hilda rose higher and higher. Even though Marianne had no wings of her own, she wrapped her arms around Hilda’s torso in an attempt to refuse the inevitable break of their kiss, and mere moments later her own feet lost contact with the ground below.

The wind kicked up around them, leaves swirling in a vortex centered around the two. As Marianne finally withdrew from Hilda’s embrace to catch her breath, she found that she no longer had the need to fill her lungs. Nor did she need to continue clinging to Hilda in an attempt to prevent falling to the ground. But she clung nonetheless, and apologized for breaking their kiss by ducking down to greet Hilda’s waiting lips once again.

A sudden flash of bright pain interrupted the motion. Marianne convulsed, her forehead crashing into Hilda’s shoulder as the unknown through her abdomen and ripped her apart from head to toe. Her cries of pain drowned out Hilda’s understanding croons, yet not even the agony that surged through her was enough to keep her from melting as Hilda lifted her chin to silence her gently.

She could think of nothing else. The pain that accompanied the feeling of her body disintegrating and rearranging felt eternal, yet so was the affection that radiated from Hilda’s many, many eyes. And in the very moment that her transformation was completed, leaving her new and fresh and at her most vulnerable, several sets of adoring wings wrapped around her, protecting her during their slow descent to the ground, allowing her a precious moment of respite. Hilda cradled her within layers of wings, allowing Marianne the time to safely regain her sense of mind and self. 

Finally, she came to awareness, catching her proverbial breath, as she no longer needed to breathe to survive.Her mind was blissfully silent of the Beast's alluring whispers for the first time since her presence had been made known to her. That wasn't to say, of course, that the Beast was gone. In place of conversation was the quiet knowledge that the devil was a  _ part  _ of her, now that there was no longer a need to try and entice her. 

The devil was within her, and Marianne felt more whole than she had ever thought possible.

“How do you feel?” Hilda asked quietly. “Like, mine hurt like  _ hell,  _ but after that, it was like… ugh, is it cliché to say it was like nothing I’d ever felt before?”

Marianne chuckled and freed herself from Hilda’s concern, rising to feet that she could no longer see but knew to be there nonetheless. 

“Like I could do anything,” she responded, turning to face Hilda with outstretched arms – two, three,  _ six  _ of them – and return but one of the many hugs that Hilda had granted her up to that point.

The transformation granted by the devil, her Beast, was ultimately complete. Her hair floated about her shoulders in a hazy cloud of blue that faded out to nothingness. An ethereal cloak ultimately concealed the greater number of her arms, and even that gradually disappeared as the train flowed down to the ground.

Their embrace was altogether too short, but Marianne took comfort in the knowledge that they would be together for time immemorial.

“Damn, Mari,” Hilda said, gently brushing her thumb against one of the thick, shimmering lines of deep blue-black that streamed down from the outer corner of Marianne’s eyes. “That’s some serious eyeliner. You’re going to have to show me how to do that soon, yeah?”

Marianne caught Hilda’s hand before she could pull it away and, leaning into her palm, offered up a satisfied smile to indicate how happy she was to be there with her.

It was a horrible, horrible world – yet as terrifying as it might have been, they would no longer have to face it alone. No, far from it. They had paid heed to the call of the devil, who had granted them the strength necessary to thrive in a cruel world determined to destroy them at any cost.

* * *

  
  
Whispers ebbed and flowed throughout the camp.

_ …ldn’t have gone out after her… _

_ …always were too fond of each other… _

_ …counselors said they became devils too… _

_ …will protect us if they catch… _

But Marianne and Hilda since drifted far away; far from their former home. They could no longer hear the accusations set forth against them.

Instead, they moved together, hand-in-hand. Their sweet, haunting calls brought forth anyone with wavering faith ever-closer to the loving, infernal salvation they had to offer.

**Author's Note:**

> this was so much fun to write? i tried to take a good deal of inspiration from how we know the devil utilized their devil, and made mari and hilda's 'devil forms' correlate to their weaknesses and transform their insecurities into their ultimate strengths. how do you think it went? i'd love to hear your thoughts.
> 
> the ever lovely [Eth](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ethereally/pseuds/Ethereally) is 100% responsible for introducing me into We Know the Devil, and thus responsible for me needing to write this! and on the other hand, my beloved [Fox](https://archiveofourown.org/users/FoxVII/pseuds/FoxVII) is to be credited for beta-ing it into readability
> 
> i can be hit up at my [tumblr](https://tansybells.tumblr.com) and my [twitter.](https://twitter.com/tansybells)
> 
> anyhew, i really hope you enjoyed reading! comments and kudos are always appreciated ❤


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